The damage here isn’t that a bunch of people need to figure out how to delete a (really quite bad) album that they got for free and are now whining about. It’s that Apple did something inconsiderate, tone-deaf, and kinda creepy for the sake of a relatively unimportant marketing campaign, and they seemingly didn’t think it would be a problem.

There’s one further point I’d like to add as to why this felt so wrong: a music library is a deeply personal collection. It is the whole sum of your life’s soundtrack. It has songs that played while you were laughing with friends, crying alone, making out with your significant other, cooking, cleaning, falling asleep, waking up, working, walking, and so much more. As we are able to take increasing amounts of music everywhere with us, we are increasingly experiencing our lives alongside a soundtrack. Songs of Innocence is an unwelcome wart on my life’s soundtrack. It has inserted itself into my library near albums of far greater importance to me. It feels like a violation of something I cherish.

Here’s a thought exercise: what if it wasn’t a U2 promotion, with their fairly vanilla, insipid tunes? What if it was a band with a bit more bite, like Deftones, or a thirtieth-anniversary reissue of Hüsker Dü’s excellent Zen Arcade? What if it was a tie-in with Run the Jewels’ new record? I wouldn’t have a problem with any of these options, but I suspect many would take offence at being pushed an album with profanity or — shock! horror! — a pointed opinion. I would, however, have a problem with the principle of it. As much as I love Run the Jewels, their new record won’t be added to my iTunes library until I do it myself.